Juror’s alleged mistake halts deliberations.

Ray Lemes (center) leaves the courtroom after a mistrial was declared. Lemes is expected to be retried in a fatal shooting outside his home.

Photo By KIN MAN HUI/Kin Man Hui/Express-News

Judge Lori Valenzuela hears from defense attorney Michael Sawyer (left) and Bexar County prosecutor David Lunan (center) before declaring a mistrial in the murder case against Ray Lemes. He was on trial in the shooting death of a college student outside his home in 2007.

Photo By Courtesy Photo

OBIT - Tracy Paul Glass, 19, of Rowena, Texas, died on Saturday, August 4, 2007 in San Antonio, Texas. Family Photo

Photo By KIN MAN HUI/Kin Man Hui/Express-News

Ray Lemes (left) listens to his attorney Michael Sawyer as Lemes' trial for shooting and killing a man outside his home in 2007 was declared a mistrial. Lemes is expected to be retried in a fatal shooting outside his home.

Photo By KIN MAN HUI/Kin Man Hui/Express-News

Ray Lemes (left) and his attorney Michael Sawyer prepare to leave the court room after a mistrial was declared. Lemes is expected to be retried in a fatal shooting outside his home.

Photo By KIN MAN HUI/Kin Man Hui/Express-News

Defense attorney Michael Sawyer speaks to media after a mistrial was declared for his client, Ray Lemes. Lemes is expected to be retried in a fatal shooting outside his home.

Photo By KIN MAN HUI/Kin Man Hui/Express-News

Prosecutor David Lunan speaks to media after a mistrial was declared for Ray Lemes. Lemes is expected to be retried in a fatal shooting outside his home.

Photo By KIN MAN HUI/Kin Man Hui/Express-News

Defense attorney Michael Sawyer speaks to media after a mistrial was declared for his client, Ray Lemes. Lemes is expected to be retried in a fatal shooting outside his home.

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A high-profile murder trial involving a San Antonio man who killed a college student in the street outside his house was derailed Wednesday evening after allegations of juror misconduct surfaced.

The 11-woman, one-man jury had been deliberating Ray Lemes' fate for nearly seven hours when it sent out a note indicating that one of them had looked up the legal definitions of “murder” and “manslaughter.”

Jurors are instructed not to conduct outside research.

The juror probably meant well, but the mistake tainted the entire group, defense attorney Michael Sawyer said, requesting a mistrial. Prosecutors asked to have the jurors continue deliberating with an instruction to ignore the information.

Outside the courtroom, attorneys for both sides agreed that the case will be retried. There's no chance Lemes will take a plea agreement and no chance prosecutors will drop the case, they indicated.

Lemes, 51, left the courthouse immediately after the ruling with an entourage of supporters. The Northwest Side resident has been under legal scrutiny since August 2007, when he ran outside his home naked with a laser-sighted pistol loaded with hollow-point bullets. His screaming wife had awakened him, saying there was an intruder in the house and he opened fire after a figure jumped from behind a brush pile in the street and lunged at him, he testified.

Angelo State University student Tracy Glass, 19, who had been visiting his sister in the same neighborhood, was found by police facedown in the street with five gunshot wounds. Authorities wondered if the teen, who was drunk, had wandered into the wrong home by mistake.

During closing arguments Wednesday morning, brothers Michael and Joe James Sawyer portrayed the case as a gun and property rights issue.

“He was doing one of the elemental things a man does, and that is, by God, to protect,” Joe James Sawyer said. “You tell me what he did wrong ... to deserve this (trial).”

The Sawyers repeatedly referred to Glass as a “burglar” who likely lunged at Lemes, they said, because he heard the homeowner yelling for his wife to call police.

“He's nothing more than a cornered rat,” Joe James Sawyer told the jury. “He's going to get caught. He won't be going to football practice. He's going to the pen.”

But jurors shouldn't be so trusting of Lemes' story, prosecutors David Lunan and Jason Garrahan responded. It doesn't make sense that Glass, who had no criminal history, would have broken into a stranger's home, or that he lunged at someone holding a gun, Lunan said.

It makes more sense, Lunan said, that Glass took a walk, got lost and perhaps made some noise outside that caused Lemes to get out of bed and confront him. There was nothing disturbed in the house, he pointed out.

The only horizontal bullet wound Glass suffered was to his back, Lunan added, suggesting that the other four bullets came after he had already started to collapse.

“In the absence of self-defense, he's guilty of cold-blooded murder. His license to carry a concealed weapon is not a license to kill,” Lunan said.